Palestinian youth killed as Israeli troops search for missing teens

A Palestinian teenager was killed and a Palestinian man was reportedly on life support after being shot by Israeli soldiers in confrontations Friday during West Bank raids in which the troops were searching for three Israeli teens believed abducted by Palestinian militants on June 12.

Muhammad Doudeen, 14, was shot in the chest in the southern West Bank town of Dura by Israeli soldiers who opened fired when they were confronted by stone-throwing Palestinians during a pre-dawn raid. Muhammad, who was struck by a stray bullet, according to a report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, later died in a Hebron hospital.

Mustafa Aslan, 24, was shot in the head in the Qalandia refugee camp, south of Ramallah, by soldiers who were confronted by dozens of Palestinians after entering the facility in the early morning hours. A relative said Aslan was on life support in a Jerusalem hospital.

The raids were part of an ongoing large-scale Israeli army operation in the West Bank since the disappearance of the three Israeli teenagers.

Soldiers rounded up 50 Palestinians on Friday, most of them members of the Islamist movement Hamas, which Israel says snatched the three teenagers. More than 300 Palestinians have been detained in the last week, according to the Palestinian rights group, the Prisoner’s Club.

Also on Friday, Israeli fighter jets struck a factory in the Gaza Strip after missiles were fired from Gaza into southern Israel.

Six people — four children, an elderly man and a woman — were said to be wounded when missiles were fired at the factory in the Zaytoun neighborhood of Gaza City, according to reports from Gaza.

Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah strongly criticized the Israeli measures during a visit to Hebron on Friday. The United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Robert Serry, said he was “deeply concerned” about the situation in the region.

He said the United Nations calls for “restraint and expects Israel to carry out the related security operations in compliance with international law and respect for the lives, dignity and livelihoods of Palestinians.”